Berthoud Living Center

Although we gave this facility a terrible overall grade, we awarded it a B- for our inspections rating. In fact, the facility received very impressive inspection report this year. Our inspection grades account for a host of factors found on a nursing home's inspection report. One key criteria we weigh heavily is the number and severity of deficiencies. This facility received 2 deficiencies on its inspection report, but fortunately none were considered severe. This indicates that the inspectors didn't deem any of the deficiencies to pose an immediate threat to patient safety or health. Finally, CMS flagged this nursing home for possible abuse or neglect. This is not what you want to see. We advise you to direct your search elsewhere.

One of the other reasons we graded this facility so highly is that it earned a very impressive nursing grade. In that area, we gave this nursing home an B-. When calculating a facility's nursing grade, we assess the quantity of hours nurses are caring for patients and the level of licensure of the nurses. This facility provides only 0.3 hours of nursing care per patient per day. This is a somewhat alarming figure which is well below the national average. Lastly, despite not having the most impressive total nursing hours, this facility performed admirably in the metric of preventing major falls. This is usually an indicator that a place has sufficient quality controls in place.

We were also surprised to find that this nursing home received a somewhat respectable short-term care score this year. We awarded it a B- in that category. In our short-term care assessment, we endeavor to craft a valuable gauge for rehabilitation services. In doing so, we analyze a facility's level of highly-skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as respiratory therapy. Unfortunately, this place was below average in terms of its quantity of registered nurse and physical therapy hours provided to its residents based on the measures we assessed. Lastly, we looked at the number of patients who were able to return to the community from this facility. We found that 4.8 percent of this facility's patients returned home. At most nursing homes, closer to half of their residents are able to return home so this figure is below average.

The next category we looked at was long-term care, in which this nursing home received a bottom of the barrel grade in this area also. Unfortunately, we gave it an F for this area, which is definitely a major disappointment. Long-term care ratings of this caliber generally are a bad sign for the quantity and quality of care provided by nurses and aids, as well as the levels of routine medical care available. Once we assessed the quantity of nursing care, we then analyzed the nursing home's vaccination records. Candidly, we were a bit alarmed this facility vaccinated only 65.51724 percent of its residents for pneumonia. To our surprise, this nursing home was actually able to limit hospitalizations. With only 0.02 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, this facility had fewer hospitalizations than many nursing homes. This was its best score in this category.